1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a group robot system in which a number of robots searching for an object operate collectively, as well as to a sensing robot and a base station used therefor.
Conventionally, referring to FIG. 62, Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 8-30327 discloses a single or a plurality of sensor mechanisms for collecting information of external environment, a practical environment recognition system operating in an actual environment and having a hierarchical information processing mechanism generating from sensor information {circle around (1)} from the sensor mechanism, appropriate motion instruction {circle around (2)} for an actuator mechanism, and an intelligent robot. According to this technique, in accordance with the state at the time of sensing, the hierarchical information processing mechanism provides motion instruction {circle around (2)} such that the actuator mechanism appropriately changes position of itself or of an object as well as external environment such as illumination, so that the sensor mechanism functions satisfactorily.
2. Description of the Background Art
In the technique described in Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 8-30327, the plurality of sensor mechanisms and sensor information processing units from upper to lower orders are always in operation.
In a robot system using other sensing robot, all sensors performs sensing with same sensitivity, that is, the same sensing resolution.
Therefore, when an object of searching is detected, a sensing robot searching in a region far from the object of searching performs the search with the same sensing resolution as that of a sensing robot searching in a region close to the object of searching.
As a result, it has been difficult to alleviate burden resulting from processing the sensor information of the sensing robot and to reduce power consumption of the sensing robot. Further, as all the sensing robots have uniform sensing resolution, it has been impossible to set sensing resolution of a specific sensing robot. Therefore, it has been difficult to set higher the sensing resolution after detecting the object of searching and to grasp detailed overall information of the object of searching in a short time period.
Therefore, in the conventional group robot system, it has been difficult to efficiently search for the object.
An object of the present invention is to provide a group robot system capable of efficiently inspecting an object when an object of searching is detected, as well as to provide a sensing robot and a base station used therefor.